A House We Build Together
by Kairos27
Summary: Stone by stone, Brittany and Santana build their home in each other.  An anthology of short pieces.
1. Scattered All Around Me

**_Scattered All Around Me_**

"What are you looking at?" Santana asks.

They're lying in Brittany's backyard, under the old oak tree that holds up the ruins of their childhood tree house. It's a late spring day, the clear kind that makes the trees look greener and more alive than ever. Brittany squints through the stirring foliage above their heads. "I'm looking at the sky."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. Remember when I asked you why my eyes were blue?"

Santana smiles. "I said that your eyes were blue because you were always looking up at the blue sky, and so all of the blue reflected in it just stayed there."

"And when I asked you how you knew that, you just said, '_Duh, I read it in a book_.'" Brittany sighs. "I never did find that book."

Santana turns onto her side to face Brittany. "I don't remember which book it was."

"That's okay; I like to think that you thought of it all by yourself. Because you totally would even if you don't want anyone to know you said mushy stuff like that."

Santana laughs; a soft, huffing laugh. "Maybe. But only for you." Her fingers cross the half-inch between their bodies and strokes Brittany's elbow. "I love your eyes."

"I know you do." Brittany's gaze turns back towards her, and Santana leans into it, the color of the sky.


	2. As A Swallow Knows The Sky

_**As A Swallow Knows The Sky**_

Guitar would be the most appropriate accompaniment, but no way in hell is she going to let Puck know about her plan ahead of everyone else. So Santana goes to the choir room between classes and shoves the sheet music into Brad's face, muttering something about passing it on to that one dude who plays the guitar and that he'd better be ready by that afternoon or else he'd face the unbridled wrath of Lima Heights.

The look on Rachel's face is hilarious when Mr. Schuester interrupts her and says that Santana specifically requested to sing first today, but for once, Santana can't enjoy the moment. Blood pounds through her limbs and sweat collects in her palms, even as she reminds herself that the actual deed of singing is no big deal. She can kill a song as well as Rachel or Kurt or Mercedes can. It's the song that she's singing, and the weight of what it means, that's pressing down and stifling her.

She clears her throat and nods once at the lone band geek with the guitar, before turning her head to face Brittany, sitting in the front row. Brittany looks excited – of course she would be, she'd never seen Santana request to go first in glee club, ever. No one has. The fact that Brittany obviously doesn't expect anything makes Santana feel a little lighter, a little less nervous. She's going to be _so_ surprised, Brittany is; she's going to be _so_ proud, and the thought makes Santana forget everything else long enough to let herself smile, as she tiptoes into the first words of the song.

_I would dial the numbers just to listen to your breath…_

Brittany's eyes widen in recognition, and how did Santana never know just how blue her eyes were? How hot and glowing, and Santana finally feels the weight of nerves and unease melting like butter under their vivid glow, Brittany the lone spotlight on Santana's stage.

Like a bird suddenly freed from its cage, Santana's voice bursts forth with words that thrum throughout the room as they emerge, big and bold and raspy and true.

_Come to my window, I'll be home soon._


	3. It Looks Like Need

_**It Looks Like Need**_

"I don't like it when Puck says you're whipped because it makes it sound like you're a horse and I'm trying to break you, I saw it on TV, Santana, there are horse tamers who beat horses when they don't behave and it makes me so sad."

_Too late_, Santana thinks, but: "It's worth it." Not _it'll be_, none of that future tense: "It _is_ all right, Brittany," because their future is here already years away from talk of cannon families (Brittany) and polyester social armor (Santana). "Puck's an asshole."

"I don't want you to be whipped," Brittany says softly; Santana's right hand plays the opening chord of a song on Brittany's abdomen, bare and still taut and ivory-sculpted. _You're the only one I can count on, my headband_— she frowns and changes the chord progression. Much better is— _I got you in the palm of my hand…_

"I know I am," Santana replies. "But I don't care. Because it means I'm doing my best. To give you everything you deserve." Which is everything good and beautiful and right and most of the time Santana isn't any of those three, so she resigns herself to doing whatever Brittany tells her to do. Because even now, years later when she's mature enough to realize that she is all Brittany really wants, she still can't quite believe it.

Brittany nuzzles at Santana's jaw; she's perfected the nuzzle, after years of studying her cats, and it makes Santana purr. And so she purrs, as Brittany continues talking. "Why do they have to say it like it's so bad, though? You're just trying to love me any way you can." Her voice catches. "And you make me happy, Santana. So, so happy. Why can't they just say it like that?"

Santana's breath leaps away from her lungs like a frightened thief from a window. Even now, _even now_ – this is Brittany who will always be reaching into her heart and lungs and claiming ownership of Santana's life and blood and breath, Brittany to whom she will always belong if only Brittany will never leave her, that's all she asks. An incredibly steep price, but the only one she'll ever demand from Brittany.

And the only words that manage to come out of Santana's mouth are: "They're just jealous."

Brittany smiles now. "They better be."

"It's okay. I don't care. I don't care what anyone says. Just don't leave me," Santana says softly, laying down her final offer.

"Never." Brittany pulls Santana closer, tangling their legs like overgrown tree roots, as if that would anchor them to Brittany's promise of _forever more than anything_. "Never ever, Santana. I won't ever leave you."


	4. Briefly It Enters, and Briefly Speaks

_**Briefly It Enters, and Briefly Speaks**_

_Infarction_ – 'Night of Neglect'

"I'll take cat diseases," Brittany says around the Dot in her mouth.

The microphone picks up the sound of sticky gelatin between her teeth, and Santana runs her hands through her hair, feeling slightly embarrassed for her. Embarrassment that is replaced by irritation when the camera captures, for a fleeting second, the disbelieving looks on Artie, Tina, and Mike's faces.

_Ringworm, conjunctivitis, kidney failure_. Brittany single-handedly gets them to the knockout round and Santana feels her heart swell with so much _feeling_, she has to get up and walk them off before they clot and give her a heart attack.

* * *

><p><em>I Didn't Know and Nobody Told Me<em> – 'Born This Way'

These days Santana feels like there's a war being fought, and she's the only one fighting. And she's losing, for everything and nothing and the lies that keep the world together.

Brittany's angry. Brittany's never angry. That means: _Brittany hates you_, Santana's puppet strings whisper in her ear even as Brittany says _I do love you_. It's not the waySantana wants to hear it, so it must mean: _I don't love you — _and here comes a newer whisper, _why would I want to_?

Love or not, the truth is Brittany's shirt, and she is Brittany's. So she wears it.

* * *

><p><em>Basherte<em>*– 'Rumours'

Brittany isn't mad at her, she says. "I'm just really _sad_ at you."

_I don't mean to be a bitch_ – but she always is. Santana's words haunt her. It's a hobby of theirs, especially where Brittany is concerned. No more regrets would mean never speaking aloud again. Actually, she could be down with that.

"I know Karofsky's not your soulmate," Brittany continues. "Nobody believes you anyway."

"The others believe me."

"I don't," Brittany replies, negative positive. "I didn't believe you. Because I know what real soulmates should be like."

There's a difference, she will say, between believing and believing in.

* * *

><p><em>flowers near seashore<em> – 'Prom Queen'

The smile on her face is full to bursting as Kurt voices his approval of her prom dress ("Satan" notwithstanding), and Tina applauds. The only one yet to comment is Brittany, and Santana feels her face softening underneath the uncertainty.

Brittany's hands are clasped under her chin, her eyes more attentive than they were when Lauren proclaimed herself a lemon meringue pie. Santana's eyes slide towards her, asking the question that only Brittany knows; she straightens and gives Santana the longest look in the history of two-second glances, until her face stretches into a reassuring half-smile.

And she nods _yes_.

* * *

><p><em>For We Meet By One or the Other<em> ('Funeral' – 'New York')

Life is short.

If anything, that should convince Santana to be less afraid. But Santana knows who she is and she is frightened.

Brittany knows too. That doesn't make it okay. Brittany deserves someone who isn't afraid – why should she settle for a coward when she has the whole damn _beautiful painful perfect _world?

She wants everything for Brittany, but she wants Brittany. Both of those choices will destroy her – but only one of them will kill her. She knows the difference. Santana knows which choice is the right one.

They say she doesn't love anybody. Well, she'll show them.

* * *

><p>*<em>Note: 'Basherte' is a Yiddish word, loosely translatable as '(female) soulmate'.<em>


	5. The Soul To The Pen

_**The Soul To The Pen**_

_You are perfect to me because you are perfect for me. _

Santana writes, and the ballpoint leaves a blotted smudge on the last 'me'.

Then she says aloud that she wants to throw up. "This makes me want to throw up." All right, not her exact words. Oh_ (don't worry)_ – she won't really throw up; she actually doesn't feel sick at all. Heartsick, but not the same thing. Where, she asks herself, is the line between pathetic and genius?

She scratches the sentence out, leaving sharp black grooves in the paper. It still won't cover up the truth of the sentence, but the truth is not her realm of expertise.

There's more than one reason they call her Satan (_the prince of lies_). Because, now she knows: she burns. She is burning, she's burning up.

She shouldn't have crossed the words out. Santana grips her pen tightly in her empty hands. Quickly she puts the pen back on the paper for some relief.

_I belong to no one unless I belong to you._

"What the hell – " (_hell, do you see what she did there?_) "—is this?" she hisses, like the lizard that she is. The pen blacks over these words as well.

Answer to the question: a love note to slip into the locker next to hers. Or, she could call it a memorandum on how to ruin herself –because her own truths always ruin everything enough as it is. _(And you wonder why she lies?_)

She crumples the page and it's not the truth anymore, except for the two words she couldn't bring herself to scratch out.

_Dear Brittany,_


	6. Response

_**Response**_

Whenever this question comes up: of whether either of them is good enough for each other, it always ends up as an argument. They're both sick of it but they can't stop. It doesn't stop. If it isn't some well-meaning acquaintance telling Brittany that Santana is a good-for-nothing bitch, then it's some nosy know-it-all hipster lesbian telling Santana that Brittany is too dumb to treat Santana's love for her seriously. One day, Brittany overhears the latter and starts moping around, which drives Santana insane, which boils over into yelling. "I don't fucking care about that, Brittany. Remember what I said? I want to be with_ you_," Santana's voice lashes out like a wounded tiger, "and I get what I want."

Brittany's heart flutters at the desperate conviction in Santana's voice, but her tone is hurt. "Even now? Am I still what you want?"

"Britt, listen to me." Santana grabs Brittany's shoulders. "I should be the one asking you that question; I've never been anything but shitty to you –"

"—Santana, that's not true."

"Let me finish. We've been best friends forever, and now…we are where we are, but you were the one who approached me that first day and wanted to be my friend." Santana's grip tightens on Brittany's shoulders. "Everything good that I've done for you since then could never pay you back for that."

Brittany shakes her head, tears filling her eyes. "But I don't want you to feel like you have to pay me back. I just want you with me. That's all I want."

"Same here." Santana lets a smile slide across her face. "That's what I've been trying to tell you for the past few minutes. Yeah, we're not perfect, and maybe neither of us deserves what we got, but we give it to each other anyway. That's the beauty of it." She pulls Brittany closer. "I'm supposed to be the scared one, remember?"

Brittany lets herself grin at that. "Right, I forgot."

"I'm yours, Brittany," Santana says quietly, her voice dwindling to a warm glow from the flame it was a minute ago. Brittany doesn't even need to think about her response.

"Proudly so."


	7. Landslide

_So it's not like I have two fanfics in progress or anything, but this is what happens when you're at work and you have 'Landslide' on repeat. _

_The style of Landslide I aspires to that of _**_lajeunefilleenfleur_**_, author of _The Only True Paradises _and_ Pas de Deux_. Landslide II tries to imitate _**_venuscomb_**_, who writes the best Brittany S. Pierce in the world. Her fic can be found at venuscomb [dot] tumblr [dot] com. _

_**Landslide**_

_I. Mirror in the Sky (Santana)_

It was a dream that you only remember part of; but if you hadn't woken up when it was clearest in your head, it would have all faded away like your nights usually do: melting into too-bright mornings that bombarded you with everything that you never bothered dreaming of because they were already real.

Someone was asking you a riddle in the dream. And you don't remember who it was or why it was being asked. You only remembered the question, which makes no sense now that you're awake, but when you were asleep, it was the clearest question you've ever been asked in your life.

In the dream, you turned your head. Brittany was looking at you. You looked back at her, as if you were expecting her to answer it in your stead. Riddles are her kind of question, after all.

You looked at her, and you saw that her eyes were blue without clouds. You looked harder and you could see yourself in them. Not just the convex reflection of your face, but all of you and everything you never wanted to show anyone else but her. It remained in her eyes even after you looked away, like you filled her and still there would always be enough room for you.

And then it didn't matter who was asking the riddle or why you were the one being asked, because you knew the answer; you were never so sure of an answer in your life.

You sat up straight with the confidence that comes with knowing and you let the answer fall off the tip of your tongue.

Your voice woke you up.

* * *

><p><em>II. Snow-Covered Hills (Brittany)<em>

Your love hangs on the wall of my heart, Santana, like the warmest coat that protects me when it gets cold in the winter.

You left it hanging there, on the clotheshook, when we were too young to know what it meant. I let you keep it there, and pretty soon we acted like it was mine because you never took it back. But for a long time I wasn't sure if you really meant for it to be mine, because you always told me that just because you left it there, with me, it didn't mean anything. And I was confused, because it had to mean something. That you trusted me with it? Maybe? I didn't know, back then. I loved it anyway, because it was yours.

Even when we were farthest away from each other, it was still with me. When I let Artie inside, he didn't even blink when he saw it. If he saw it. He obviously thought it was mine. I still didn't know for certain, but I let him believe that. It was easier than telling him it was yours.

You couldn't stay away, though. You came back. And I always let you. Every time, I thought that it had to be the last time, because it was cheating, after all. Every time should have been the time that you were finally going to take what was yours and leave an empty place on the wall of my heart. A place that was never empty after I first met you.

And then you cried, when you finally told me it was mine. You cried and you were angry and hurt; you made both of us feel like I was the one making you leave (although you were the one who left, I just let you because I knew there was no way I could make you stay).

When you left, I went back inside my heart to think about what we did wrong and then I saw it, your love still hanging there. For a moment I thought you'd forgotten to take it with you again, until I remembered. You told me that it's mine now. It hung there for so long, and maybe it started off on accident, but now you've told me that you meant to keep it there all along. It's the truth because you looked me in the eye when you said it. I know you always look away from me when you lie.

Santana, I'll take your love. I'll take it down; I'll put it on, I'll wrap it around me. It'll keep me warm and protect me when I climb the mountains, the ones I have to climb before we find each other again.


	8. Your Heartbeat A Bird

_**Your Heartbeat A Bird**_

We're sitting across from each other in the bath and you're telling me a story. I can't see below your shoulders — we put a lot of bubble soap in the water and the foam is thick around our bodies. The day after I tried the words '_President Pierce_' on my tongue and found that I liked them, you went to the library and came back to me with the story you're telling me now, about the fourteenth President of the United States. The real President Pierce.

It's a sad story, but I listen to the words anyway because they're dressed in your voice — I watch the steam rising from your skin and I think about how sweet you'll smell once we towel off. How sweet you smell now.

This bathtub isn't even that big — our knees bump into each other every so often — but I want to be closer to you, I want you to sit with me like they do in the movies, the back of your heart to my front so that I can hold it against my breast and know what it feels like. What you and your deepest secrets feel like.

But today you don't think you deserve that, I can tell. Sometimes it seems like you think too hard about whether you can allow yourself to let me touch you, to hold your hand. Like you think you have to ask.

You never have to ask, Santana.


End file.
